{"id":826,"date":"2026-03-13T11:12:45","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T11:12:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/?p=826"},"modified":"2026-03-13T11:12:45","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T11:12:45","slug":"recalling-our-perfect-day-against-everton-in-1998-history-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/?p=826","title":{"rendered":"Recalling our perfect day against Everton in 1998 | History | News"},"content":{"rendered":"


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On May 3, 1998, we had the opportunity to win the Premier League title in front of our own supporters at Highbury if we could beat Everton.<\/p>\n

The last time the Gunners had secured the league crown in N5 came in 1953, when a thrilling 3-2 victory against Burnley confirmed that Tom Whittaker\u2019s side were First Division champions by the narrowest of margins – 0.099 of a goal. This time, the statistics were tilted fully in Arsenal\u2019s favour.<\/p>\n

Seven points ahead, they needed just three more from their remaining three games to hold off the challenge of Manchester United and be crowned champions of the new competition for the first time. On a beautiful afternoon, Arsene Wenger\u2019s team completed the job in spectacular style at a jubilant Highbury. It was a perfect day in every sense of the word.<\/p>\n

We had slipped effortlessly into scintillating form when spring arrived, with newcomers Emmanuel Petit and Nicolas Anelka developing into polished Premier League performers to help us embark on a 10-match winning streak.<\/p>\n

Despite the Gallic influence, our English back four, comprising Tony Adams, Martin Keown, Lee Dixon and Nigel Winterburn, was still in place, and they had to be at their best during a tense and niggly 1-0 victory against Derby County just four days before the Everton match, with Petit thumping home a late winner.<\/p>\n

Striker Christopher Wreh, who contributed some vital goals during the run-in, recalled during our 2004 interview: \u201cIn the dressing room before the game, Arsene talked about the fact that we were on the cusp of a great achievement, and how wonderful it would be to win the title at Highbury. The French guys \u2013 Manu and Patrick (Vieira) slapped hands before we ran out. Tony and Lee just nodded at one another. It was time to get it done.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was a carnival atmosphere in N5, with the expectant crowd basking in the sunshine and waving flags and banners. By half-time, we were already cruising. Slaven Bilic headed into his own net to put us 1-0 up, and Howard Kendall\u2019s relegation-haunted team, who avoided the drop by just a single point, collapsed as Dutch winger Marc Overmars\u2019 shot squirmed under the body of goalkeeper Thomas Myhre to put us two up.<\/p>\n

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The turbocharged Gunners went into overdrive in the second half. Overmars stormed through and slid home a third while the party atmosphere increased further when Ian Wright, who\u2019d lost his place in the side to Anelka in the winter, entered the fray as a substitute on his Highbury farewell to ecstatic cheers.<\/p>\n

Skipper Adams then rifled home a memorable fourth goal, after being put through by Steve Bould, who\u2019d also come on as a substitute. \u201cThat sums it all up,\u201d famously bellowed Martin Tyler on Sky Sports. \u201cWe shall not be moved,\u201d chorused the Highbury crowd.<\/p>\n

Gunners fan George Tyson recalled Adams\u2019 celebration \u2013 walking towards the North Bank with arms outstretched \u2013 \u201cas being almost religious. It still makes the hairs on my neck stand up when I think about it now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thirteen days after securing their first Premier League title, we won the FA Cup final at Wembley to clinch the Double. It was a glorious and unforgettable time to be a Gunners supporter.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Copyright 2026 The Arsenal Football Club Limited. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.arsenal.com as the source.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On May 3, 1998, we had the opportunity to win the Premier League title in front of our own supporters at Highbury if we could beat Everton. The last time … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":827,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}